Canada will impose a new round of tariffs on US products in retaliation to President Trump’s tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, Reuters reports.
Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland said that the government will announce new tariffs targeting American products that may have the biggest “impact” on the United States as Trump refuses to lift his steel and aluminum tariffs despite ongoing negotiations.
In 2018, Canada imposed $12.5 billion worth of tariffs on US goods in its initial response to Trump’s tariffs. The initial list targeted orange juice, maple syrup, whiskey, toilet paper, and a number of other types of products.
“We are certainly constantly looking at ways to refresh the retaliation list ... to have an even greater impact,” Freeland told reporters Tuesday.
The new list of targets will be announced as soon as next week, according to David MacNaughton, Canada’s ambassador to the United States.
The new list is expected to include pork, apples, ethanol, and wine.
Americans hit hardest by Trump’s trade war:
Trump’s tariffs have done little to affect actual policy, despite his claim that trade wars are “good” and “easy to win,” and several studies have found that Americans are paying billions in added costs on goods as a result.
A study released in March by economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Columbia and Princeton Universities found that Trump’s tariffs had “no impact” on foreign exporters and were “almost completely passed through into US domestic prices.”
“We find that the U.S. tariffs were almost completely passed through into U.S. domestic prices, so that the entire incidence of the tariffs fell on domestic consumers and importers up to now, with no impact so far on the prices received by foreign exporters,” the report said. “We also find that U.S. producers responded to reduced import competition by raising their prices.”
The study found that the trade wars have cost Americans $1.4 billion per month.
Trump’s “new NAFTA” could hurt US consumers too:
Aside from the tariffs, the Trump administration has negotiated a revised version of NAFTA with Canada and Mexico, the USMCA, which still has to be approved by Congress. If approved, a key provision in the agreement could raise the cost of cars to consumers.
The Center for Automotive Research found that the USMCA would essentially levy a tariff of up to $3.8 billion on cars due to a requirement that a certain percentage of the car’s body must be made from North American parts.
That provision may raise the price of a large number of cars by up to $2,200, the report said.
